Aarnr revises his opinion of these chance-met nuthooks.  Clearly they are as opposed to the demon-worshiping masons as himself.  Though given the gist of the foppish codpiece's remarks, he wisely chooses not to thank them, lest they take it amiss.

Nor, having learned something of the ways of these decadent folk, does the priest offer Bowbe's blessings to the travellers.  Sadly the puttocks do not see best wishes for an exciting and violent day as the benison it truly is.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:20, Mon 18 July 2016.

Only three hours!  Rejoice!

Barely holding back a squeal of delight, Eilieen nods her head frantically at the description.  It all sounds correct.  They'll need to make certain, of course - it wouldn't do for Aarnr to start lopping off heads willy-nilly, no matter what Bowbe's priest thinks - but everything seems promising.

The priestess bows low.  "I thank you, sir," she adds to Arkan's words.  "Blessings of Zadastha upon you and yours!"  Then she hops in place from foot to foot.  "Three hours!" Eilieen agrees with Arkan.  "If it is indeed them, we are fortunate something occurred to give them pause - perhaps they needed to dig up artifacts hidden outside the city, or hide the same?  Whatever the reason, let us not squander this good fortune!"

"Or maybe as they was just wantin' ter be out of the gate afore some one were findin' that Feldon were dead, an' when they was a bit away they was makin' camp fer the night."  The smile on Colwyn's face clearly says that he's enjoying this new sport of guessing the motivation of the villains.

As opposed to just killing them without worrying about why they did anything they did.

He looks at thee forest to each side of the road, "We might've been passin' their camp any time, only a dozen yards from it, an' not saw no sign of it, on account of the woods."

The foppish gentleman bids them a good day, and best wishes for their pursuit of the labourers.  And then the three riders, and the wagon, proceed on their way to Bard's Gate.

"Yer knows," Colwyn muses, still studying the forest, "we could be bein' watched right now, an' not be knowin' a bloody thing about it afore one of is gettin' a arrer in their bleedin' eye."

Quite by coincidence, he raises a hand to shield his eyes from the sun...

Glancing at Colwyn with a raised eyebrow Arkan replies, "That's possible yes, but unlikely given they passed that wagon a few hours earlier. Unless they doubled back, but then why would they?"

Smiling at Eileen's hopping he adds, "I feel confident about this also, but considering they outnumber us perhaps we should work on a plan on how to deal with them once we catch up."

That assumed they don't manage to mingle and vanish among the general population in the town, that is.

"Zadastha's cloak," Eilieen mildly blasphemes.  "Worry about odds when we find them - plans change, Sir Arkan, based on circumstance."  She pauses.  "And Aarnr," the priestess finishes with a small shrug.  "Best we decide upon such things upon viewing our opponents."

A sidelong glance at Colwyn follows, along with an arched eyebrow.  "But Colwyn, it is yourself upon whom we depend, here, to anticipate such eye-piercing arrows, or sense the presence of our enemies before they loose their ambush upon us.  Your eyes, keen as a hawk's...your nose, sharp as a wolf's...your ears, cunning as a bunny's.  Let nothing slip by you!" she exhorts with a broad smile.

A pause, then she continues.  "Also, your camp idea seems much more likely than my own," the priestess sighs.

Erista's sleeping form giggles quietly when Eilieen praises Colwyn.

But she's clearly sleeping, so it was probably just something funny in her dream.

"If they dare to launch their arrows at us, then we'll know we've froggin' found them," Aarnr is amazed that anyone gives any thought to such trivialities as being stuck in the eye.

"Hopefully the bat-foulin' hedgepigs are too stupid to know who they face ... else they might cower in the woods and we might miss them !"  Colwyn's concern mirrors his own.  Yet to scour the area beyond the tree line every step of the way to whatever name the nuthooks have bestowed upon the next den of vice and sloth could see the pursuers lagging further behind their prey.

The party start to move onward along the road, and the day continues much as it had started, with two small differences...

First: knowing that their prey is a shorter distance ahead than they had thought lends a certain spring to their stride, making their progress faster.

And second: Colwyn is nervously watching the forest to either side every step of the way...

The day slides towards late afternoon, and they round a long curve in the road, to find that a peculiar site meets their gaze.  Twin granite stelae flank the road ahead, like ancient weather-beaten gate posts.  Their surfaces are covered with pictographs and roughly carved writing.  The markings have been recently limned with what appears to be red paint, to make them stand out more clearly.  And both stones bear, at their upper ends, the unmistakable image of a crown.

Curious, Eilieen hurries ahead (so as to not slow the group) and pauses a safe (?) distance from the stelae.  Her brow furrows as she studies them, seeking enlightenment.

Knowledge: Religion 19

Not exactly curious but very much hoping that these symbols are an indication of a den of demon-worshippers, Aarnr turns his fearsome gaze in the direction of the stone uprights as his mighty oxen tear down the trail ...

... but swiftly concludes that there is nothing at all out of the ordinary here.  Indeed such things are likely seen on every other street corner in the cesspits these folk call cities.  There's probably some fat shop-keep counting his coin nearby.

OOC: 20:33, Today: Aarnr Foultongue rolled 6 using 1d20+5.  Knowledge (Religion).

The twin granite monuments, standing in stark contrast to the monotony of the road draw Akran's interest, as they appear to do with everyone else.

"Fascinating." Arkan says, walking forward and standing close to one of the monuments, trying to determine their age and what civlization might have constructed them

---

Knowledge (History): 13

There is a sudden cawing sound, and a raven flaps down to land heavily atop the stele on the left side of the road.  It glares at the travellers, utters another series of harsh cries, and starts to clean its beak against the stone...

"Oh... that isn't bein' a good sign." Colwyn declares.  "It's bein' well known as 'ow ravens is killin' things, an' gen'rally bein' bad luck."

Ozzy regards him sceptically, "I never heard anything like that."  He returns his attention to the stones.  "If we were up around Acregor, I'd say these stones were a warning.  A warning that you're entering somebodies territory.  Like a kingdom, or a fortified town, where you'll be subject to the local laws.  Down here, though, I have no idea."

"The bloody raven's bein' the warnin'."

"Let's kill the raven," Aarnr proposes.  "As a warnin'."  The priest can't see what all the concern is about.  It's just a froggin' rune-scribed marker stone with an ominous bird atop it.

"These stones...are old. I do not recall any known civilization that might have constructed these, but there could have been any number of reasons for their being made here." Arkan announces, after looking over the constructs with a keen gaze.

Raising a gloved finger he points at the chipped and cracked lines of paint within the carvings on one of the monuments. "Someone has relatively recently painted these carvings, to make them more visible. I wonder why though, but obviously they hold some meaning for whoever did so."

Ozzy laughs aloud at Aarnr's suggestion, "You're getting as bad as Colwyn... "

"'Ere!"

"It's only a bird."

Arkan's comment draws his interest though.  "Maybe whoever erected the stones was a distant forefather of the people who painted them, and that's why they're still important."

"They bear no resemblance to any godly idols of which I am familiar," Eilieen muses.  "Oswald likely has the right of it.  But much as I wish to tarry and examine them further -" her brows knit together; who would wish for the signs to be more clear? "- I believe we have business ahead.  Business with a select group of individuals: worshippers of a demon lord."

"As for bad luck," she continues with a sigh and an arch glance toward Colwyn, "that would be nothing new for us, would it?"

"Yeah, well... " Colwyn looks around quickly, then stoops to pick up a pine cone.  He hurls it in the general direction of the raven, which steps aside, before giving the rogue a withering look, and flapping away into the forest.

"Just cause we's 'avin' a pile of bad luck most of the time, I's not seein' as 'ow we's needin' ter be makin' it feel at 'ome."

His shoulders slump.

"Course. now the buggers like as not been an' gone an' cursed me."
This message had punctuation tweaked by the player at 18:29, Fri 05 Aug 2016.

"Those squawks ?  That's not froggin' proper cursin'," Aarnr reassures the rogue, and in truth Bowbe's priest ought to know about such things.

"Someone curses ye, ye curse the nuthook right back," he instructs Colwyn in the finer art of tit for tat as he continues to steer his oxen down the road.

Beyond the stelae, the road winds gently into the forest, which grows denser as the party travels further from Bard's Gate.

On both sides of the road, at regular intervals, are wooden posts, some four feet tall, and painted white.  Near the top of each is carved an image of a crown, just like the ones on the standing stones, and these images are, again, limned in red paint.

The road itself seems to be in good repair, with few ruts and pot holes.

The priest knows what the posts represent, even without someone having to explain it patiently to him, at least twice.  Obviously the chief of these city folk, or king as he is known, lays claim to the lands beyond the posts and is warning off any who would venture there that such would constitute a direct affront to his authority.

This is well, though the warning would be much more effective were each poles topped by an actual bloody head and not a mere symbolic representation.  Once more Bowbe's finest regrets the loss of the giant's head.

The chief must be powerful, or at least consider himself so, for there are a lot of these posts.  It will be quite hard work for Aarnr, on his triumphant return from Rappan Athuk, to gather them all up and throw them down contemptuously at the puttock's feet when he challenges him to personal combat for the right to rule.

At least he has his cart in which to carry the markers ...

Noting the wooden posts with a raised eyebrow Arkan says, "Well this is starting to seem as if someone around here doesn't want travelers around these parts."

It appears to him that this is a crude way of someone marking their territory. Question was, was whomever that did this in league with the cultists they were pursuing?

If yes, this could make things quite a bit more complicated...

The posts are a mystery, but one which is forgotten, at least for the moment, as the party round a bend, and find themselves on the edge of a clearing.  The road continues onward, but in the cleared area to one side stands a cottage, with a small plot of land where vegetables are growing.

An enclosure at the side of the dwelling contains two goats, and firewood is neatly stacked in a shelter a short distance away.

There is nobody immediately visible, but the goats speak for the smallholding being occupied, as do the well-tended crops.

Having studied the posts - pointlessly, they tell her nothing - Eilieen considers the current conundrum.  "If someone doesn't like travellers, we'll be pilgrims," she finally states, confident that will solve the problem.  Who would be so horrid as to pursue people for their religious beliefs?

"Now, we need to get back to running down those worshippers of Orcus," she mutters darkly.  "Perhaps if we just push through this area as swiftly as possible?  It's a nice cottage," she notes, "but we have many more hours in the day to travel, yet."

Blissfully unaware that the posts are a mystery, Aarnr stares at the cottage thoughtfully for a few seconds before coming to a definitive, "Too froggin' nice to house those rump-fed, scurvy lewdsters."

The cart trundles on at somewhat less than a break-neck pace, and it is a few long minutes before he turns to ask Eilieen, almost casually, "What's a pilgrim ?"